His speech against rampant capitalism, how ordinary citizens won't be able to partake in an undemocratic governmental system decided by shareholders rather than members of the electorate, and how OCP's atomised apartment block units will destroy neighbourhood communities, is the most heroic moment in the entire franchise.
shareI know. And everything he said would come to pass, as witnessed in the third film.
shareI always thought the Old Man's speech was more convincing than the Mayor's. What's more democratic than owning stock in Detroit, thus owning a piece of the city? LOL.
sharethe mayor character was annoying. and bad actor.
shareThat's a fair point. The guy that played him overacted somewhat, BUT I still like what the character stood for and was trying to do. He was a good guy with principles, which is more than can be said for practically every other character in the Robocop universe.
By the way, you can probably guess that I am the OP to this thread.
Did we watch the same movie? The mayor I saw was a total self server. He even abandoned his people to get killed by Kane
shareHe didn't 'abandon' his own people. They were killed, and he escaped. What was he meant to do? Put himself in the line of fire, and join them?
He didn't push anyone in the way, or leave them to perish in such a way where his intervention might have made a difference.
And although he was doing dodgy dealings with Cain's old gang, that was only because the debt OCP had lumbered th city with, had left him with no choice. He was being pragmatic and was forced to work with criminals, in order to save the city (or at least the parts of it too poor to afford stocks in OCP).
No character in these films has entirely clean hands, but at least Mayor Kuzak was doing things for the right reasons (i.e. to keep the city out of debt, and out of the hands of a private corporation like OCP).
haha did you post this thread on old imdb? it is good they save all these thread in archive so we can re-launch conversation from past. like archive
yes you use good word harvey, 'overacted'. this man go way overboard in performance. overacting always take me out of film. this man just scream and shout. if they cast better actor then i may like this character more, regardless of him being good man with good principles.
why was mayor doing deal with hob and angie? i do not understand this part.
Hob and Angie planned to do a deal with the Mayor. They'd bail the city out of its debt to OCP, if the Mayor agreed to go easy on their criminal enterprises.
shareah yes i understand now. was it the old man or dr faxx who told cain to follow mayor to hob's hideout and kill them all?
shareI'm not 100% sure, but it might have been Dr Faxx, which then allowed the Old Man to wipe his hands of her.
The Old Man had a tendency to do this across the movies, firstly with Dick in the first film. He'd want his minions to do everything they could for OCP, but then wipe his hands of them, and cast them as the villain, if they 'went too far'. It reminds me a bit of the President in Clear and Present Danger, who 'only implied' to his minions that they do something drastic about the drug cartels, but denied any responsibility once they used illegal means.
thank you harvey for response, this is interesting point you make that i never think of.
wasnt the old man a good man in robocop 1? and it was dick jones who was bad guy and he undermine old man? and isnt this what dr faxx does? that faxx is female dick jones? for example faxx was not supposed to use violent criminal subject for robocain, and the old man did not know this?
i know that they make the old man more evil in robocop 2.
No the “Old Man” was never good, just the first film was a lot more subtle and clever about his character. He wasn’t a full fledged villain in the first film, he did legitimately want to end crime in Old Detroit just it was for his own personal gain rather than wanting to do the right thing.
sharethank you for response moviechatuser497.
dan o'herlihy is great actor. actor of this caliber is what make robocop 1 and 2 fantastic movies.
He's great in Halloween III: Season of the Witch. Have you seen it?
shareyes i have seen this film halloween 3 harvey. it have good original story but is too weird for my taste. kid head melting from mask wtf? woman head melting in hotel room wtf ?too much weird shit. i do not like over weird shit in movie i watch film. but tom atkins and dan o'herlihy are great actor, and tommy lee wallace is great director.
halloween and its sequels is best horror slash franchise. much better than friday 13th franchise (aka gore & tits the 13th) and nightmares on elm street franchise.
Right!
Plus, there were so many *even worse and more obvious* baddies in the first film, it was easy to overlook how evil the Old Man really was.
Was he ‘evil’? He wanted to end crime while making a buck in the process 🤷🏻♂️
shareagreed. to me dick jones was evil in robo 1, and juliette faxx was evil in robo 2.
the old man was just like the cermudgen head of OCP who always have subordinate under him trying to undermine position and the old man comes off untouchable at end. he like teflon don of robo world. legend character.
Yeah, I was never comfortable with Robo 2 retooling the Old Man as a villain. It detracts from the awesome ending of 1 when he says:
‘Nice shooting, son. What’s your name?’
‘Murphy’
It was better to have Murphy win the approval of a decent guy, rather than some asshole villain.
yes good point. old man cannot be bad man after this great ending show him to be great warm man in robo 1
i think robo 2 have different writer than robo 1 and they decide to take this character in new directions. but i still dont see him as bad man in robo 2. faxx and cain are the dick jones and boddicker of robo 2. old man not really villain in robo 2.
LOL: "We will sue your asses", "Give it your best shot" (I always say that whenever someone makes a threat I know they can't follow through on)
sharei laughed when he say "it's bullshit you senile old bastard!" but i liked mayor's fat assistant more. this poor man did not stand chance when cain show up!
shareI don’t think he was a bad actor.
He was written to be this way. The guy was an idiot that got in over his head by signing up with OCP. He couldn’t handle the pressures of the job. So, he was always anxious and overwhelmed.
Well, Mr. Manfredsinjohn, my father was in the secret service and I know perfectly well you do not notify the public when you are debriefing KGB agents in a safe house.
share